These Levain Bakery-Style Chocolate Peppermint Cookies are going to become your new go-to this holiday season! Supremely thick 6-oz chocolate cookies stuffed to the brim with peppermint chips, white chocolate and semi-sweet chocolate chips! So good!
Oops, I have seriously done it AGAIN and I regret NOTHING.
I know I just posted another Levain inspired recipe last week, but I couldn’t wait another freaking minute before posting these. They have catapulted to the very tippy TOP of my favorites list. TRULY. I am a peppermint FIEND and these cookies were seriously divine. A must make for sure.
Levain cookies look intimidating because of their size, but don’t let that scare you off. These are just as easy as any other cookie recipe. Minimal chill time, similar ingredients, big impactful flavor. However, because of their size, there’s a few key components that make Levain cookies a little different.
Here are a few key components to creating the perfect Levain copycat cookies:
- Cake flour: Cake flour is used to create a light and tender crumb. Despite their size, these cookies still remain surprisingly light and tender. How? Cake flour! If all all-purpose flour were to be used, these cookies would turn out dense and scone-like. Cake flour lightens things up a bit and is signature at Levain.
- Cornstarch: Cornstarch is my personal secret weapon for cookie recipes. It gives a tenderness to cookies and yields soft, chewy cookies.
- Brief chill-time: This cookie dough briefly chills for 20 minutes for the best flavor and to prevent a ton of spreading.
- Extra mix-ins: You’ll notice this cookie recipe has 3.5 cups (!) of mix-ins. That’s not a typo! It’s a deliberately large amount for two reasons: 1) for flavor, and 2) to help maintain structure and prevent spreading. Because of their colossal shape, these cookies need some structure somewhere and the mix-ins help maintain the structure of the cookie and help prevent too much spreading as well.
And for optimal baking results, check out these tips:
- Shape: I like to shape these cookie dough balls rough and loose. In cookie recipes we’re used to, a cookie dough scoop is used and those create compact, tight and smooth balls of dough. But for these recipes, we want a loosely packed, rougher looking cookie dough ball with a craggy texture. For accuracy, I like measuring out 6 oz of dough using a digital cooking scale.
- Size: These cookies weigh a whopping 6 ounces each, so I like using a digital cooking scale to measure out that amount of cookie dough. Because of their size, I like to only bake 4 cookie dough balls on one baking sheet at a time and stagger the dough balls 3″ apart from one another to help with consistent baking and prevent spreading. We’ll also only bake one baking sheet at a time for consistent results.
- Do not over-bake!: Levain’s cookies are notorious for being underbaked and gooey in the middle and that’s our goal here as well, too. These cookies have a baking time range from 8-12 minutes. Because everyone’s oven operates differently, it’s important to see when your best timing will be. For this reason, I highly recommend baking a test cookie to gauge your perfect timing. Mine were done at the 9-minute mark, but yours may be different. A test cookie is the perfect way to test this timing. Remember: the cookies will continue to finish cooking as they cool on the baking sheets, so don’t over-bake!
- One at a time: For best results, we’re baking 4 cookie dough balls per sheet, one sheet at a time, in the center rack of the oven.
Chocolaty, gooey, pepperminty goodness. You guys are going to swoon over these Levain-Style Chocolate Peppermint Cookies!
Levain Bakery-Style Chocolate Peppermint Cookies
These Levain Bakery-Style Chocolate Peppermint Cookies are insanely delicious and perfect for the holidays! Jam packed with peppermint chips, white chocolate and semi-sweet chocolate, these fudgy, gooey cookies are a dream!
Servings: 9 cookies
Ingredients
- 1 cup COLD unsalted butter, cut into cubes
- 1½ cups granulated white sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1½ tsp pure vanilla extract
- 1 tsp peppermint extract
- 1 tsp cornstarch
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 cup cake flour
- 1½ cups all-purpose flour
- 1¼ cups Andes peppermint baking chips
- 1 cup white chocolate chips
- 1¼ cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
Instructions
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the cubed cold butter and the granulated sugar on low speed for 30 seconds. Increase speed to medium and beat for another 30 seconds. Lastly, increase speed to medium-high and continue beating for 30 more seconds or until butter mixture is creamy and pale.
Add in the eggs, one at a time, followed by the vanilla and peppermint extracts. Scrape down the bottom and sides of the bowl as needed. Add in the cocoa powder, baking soda, cornstarch, salt, flour, and cake flour and mix on low speed until the cookie dough comes together. Lastly, stir in the Andes peppermint baking chips, white chocolate and semi-sweet chocolate chips. Refrigerate for 20 minutes.
Preheat oven to 410° degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or silicone liner. Using a digital cooking scale for accuracy, measure out a loosely packed, roughly textured ball of dough weighing at 6-ounces. I like to make my dough balls on the taller side to help with spreading as well. Place 3″ apart, staggered, on the baking sheet, using only 4 dough balls per sheet.
Bake one sheet of cookies at a time in the center rack of the oven for 8-12 minutes or until just about set. The exterior will appear dry and duller textured. Allow the cookies to cool on the baking sheets for at least 30 minutes before cutting or serving as the cookies are quite fragile when they’re hot. Keep remaining cookie dough refrigerated when not in use.
Notes
I recommend using Andes peppermint baking chips for this. They are basically peppermint flavored chocolate chips so they melt and get soft. I do not recommend using candy cane pieces because those are made of pure sugar and will caramelize and burn. If you cannot find the Andes peppermint baking chips (often found this time of year near the holiday baking aisle/chocolate chip aisle), you can always chop up peppermint bark into bite-size pieces!
I am in LOVE with these ultra gooey, fudgy and pepperminty cookies and I know you guys are going to love these.
Have a super sweet day!
xo, Hayley
